"He skinned Tremaine Lane alive," Shane said softly.
She didn't answer but squeezed his hand. "You need a hospital."
"I'll settle for a kiss."
So that's what they did until Luis Rosario and Jo-Jo Knight dropped into the two seats facing them.
"Is this what white people do after a gun-fight?" Rosario asked. "Cubans just drink and sing."
"I thought Cubans drank and made love to sheep." Knight grinned.
"Okay, okay." Alexa grinned. "Knock it off, you guys."
Jo-Jo said, "Unless you want this bird to circle over the water, we need to figure out where we want to go. Here's what me and this little freeway dancer figured out: your buddy Jody tried to cash in the escrow account in Aruba, but Sandro and Papa Joe beat him to it. By the time he showed up, they already cleaned it out. I think Papa Joe also set up the Vikings to be killed by the San Andresitos in Maicao after you delivered the product up there. You guys were just donkeys; he was never gonna share that money with you."
"After Jody went to Aruba and discovered the money was gone, he disappeared on a charter flight to Florida," Rosario said. "We lost the trail in Miami. Can't figure why he'd be going to Florida, anyway."
"Jody's not going there," Shane said. "He might have filed his flight plan for Miami, but trust me, he's going wherever Papa Joe and Sandy Mantoor are. Jody's gonna kill those two for setting him up and taking his money." Shane ran it over in his mind for a minute. "Papa Joe's got a house in Palm Springs. Maybe there."
Alexa shook her head. "After we broke the code book and found Jose Mondragon's name, we hit that desert house looking for clues to where you might be. I'm afraid that site got burned. Jose won't be going back to the Springs."
Shane gave it some more thought. "L. A.," he finally said.
"Why L. A.?" Alexa frowned. "That's the hardest place for him to hide. Three thousand cops there know he's alive and what he looks like."
"Because that's where Lisa told me she was going, and Lisa's his only contact to Papa Joe. I know this guy. It's personal… Jody is gonna get his money back, or die trying."
Alexa went forward to tell the pilot while Shane put his head back on the seat and closed his eyes. He was bone-tired. Sleep came in seconds.
They were at Ryder Field… Back in the sixth grade. Jody in his Pirates uniform, smiling at Shane… Slamming a ball into his pitcher's mitt, pulling it out, throwing it back again. "Good game. Hot Sauce… Way t'call the hitters. "
"You threw the Ks," Shane answered, his own voice bright and happy.
"We're a team. Nothing can ever change that." Jody grinned.
Shane suddenly felt the need to tell Jody how he really felt: how much his friendship meant… What it was like to have been left at a hospital… To have never known his own parents… To be raised by strangers. How he never knew his mother. How he would lie in bed wondering why she had left him. Who was she? Why didn't she care enough to keep him? "You're all I have," Shane finally said. "You're the only one who ever cared about me."
Little Jody grinned and dropped the ball, throwing his arm around his ten-year-old buddy. "Don't you forget it, Hot Sauce."
"I'll never forget," Shane said, with all his heart. "You have my solemn promise."
Chapter 47
CITY OF ANGELS
THEY MADE A fuel stop at Love Field in Dallas. Alexa had radioed ahead and arranged for a medical team to take a look at Shane's leg. The bullet had passed through the lastus laterus muscle, barely missing the abductor canal.
So much for karma.
The slug had threaded its way through a complex maze of potential disasters while doing very little damage. They stitched and bandaged him up, gave him a shot of antibiotics, then told him to check with a doctor in L. A.
They took off from Love Field an hour later.
Los Angeles was in the middle of a horrible inversion layer that trapped the city's smoggy pollutants like smoke under a blanket.
The Citation landed at Van Nuys airport at three-thirty in the afternoon, taxied up to the small Customs shack at the end of Runway 2–6, and shut down.
Tony Filosiani was waiting for them beside the grandfather of the Crown Vies. The old beige and brown Ford fit the funky L. A. day.
"I'm sorry about the way this went down, Sergeant," the chief said as they deplaned. "I know we mind-fucked ya, but I didn't know what else t'do."
"It saved my life," Shane admitted as he limped over to the car and stood leaning against it. "It fooled me, so I fooled Jody."
"We been trying t'get a fix on this Lisa St. Marie person you radioed me about," Filosiani said, getting right to business. "We finally got an address from the whadda-ya-callit… From the taxes."
"The State Real Estate Tax Board?" Alexa corrected.
"Yeah. She bought a condo in Century City two years ago. The address just came in. I got a five-man jump-out squad stationed over there. They say, according to the doorman, she's upstairs. They got the place covered till we get there."
"Let's go. I'll fill you in on the way," Shane said through punched and swollen lips. Then he turned to Jo-Jo and Luis. "Thanks for the backup, guys." He shook hands with Knight.
When the fed pulled his hand back, he found that he had the STD transmitter in his palm.
"I found that floating in the airplane toilet," Shane said. "Guess it's yours."
"Damn… I hope ya washed it off," Knight said, glowering at the little white pill.
Shane shook hands with Rosario. "Stay in touch, amigo," he said, then turned and opened the rear door of the plainwrap. As he slid into the chiefs musty car, Shane could see that true to form, the Day-Glo Dago had cut himself no slack when it came to the perks of office. The backseat was torn, and the car smelled of stale tobacco.
Alexa paused to say good-bye to Jo-Jo and Luis, kissing both of them lightly on the cheek. "You guys are the best," she told them.
"Hear that, you little Cuban faggot?" Jo-Jo said, grinning. "I'm the best."
"Ain't what she told me," Luis said, winking at Alexa. "She told me she thinks you're the biggest, slowest sack a'shit this side a'the post office."
"At least I don't roast no live chickens in motel bathtubs, you greasy Santeria."
Chief Filosiani shook his head in mock distress, but he was grinning as he settled behind the wheel. Alexa followed, and Chief Filosiani pulled away from the Customs building.
"Them two… Jesus," he said, shaking his head. "They never stop with that shit."
Filosiani turned onto the 101 Freeway, took it to the 405, then over the hill into West L. A.
In less than twenty minutes they were in Century City, pulling up to a twenty-story high-rise with a huge marble monument sign out front that announced the building: CENTURY PARK WEST.
The tall steel-and-glass tower poked up through the afternoon sky, its top-floor mirrored windows disappearing into the brown L. A. muck.
They were met by Lieutenant Lincoln Heart, who was leading the team of jump-outs. Heart was ebony black, and his short-sleeved Class C uniform barely concealed a physique of rippling muscles.
There were two blue-uniformed officers waiting in the lobby. They learned that two more were already up on Lisa's floor, watching her apartment.
"You got a floor plan?" Filosiani asked.
"Yep, got it from the building manager. Ms. St. Marie's got an east view, two-bedroom," Lieutenant Heart said as he opened a folded Xerox of the plan. They studied it while Heart continued: "According to the doorman, she came home last night 'bout midnight. Her car's still in the underground garage. Far as he knows, she hasn't left and nobody's been up to see her." Lieutenant Heart reached into his pocket and produced a key. "Here's the master to that floor."
"How you wanna do this, Lieutenant Hamilton?" Filosiani quizzed Alexa. It was his management style to be a coach to his officers but let them run the operations.
Shane smiled when he called her "Lieutenant," realizing that in his absence, her promotion had come
through.
"We need to get Ms. St. Marie to cooperate, and I think Shane has the best chance of turning her. We may need to use her as bait to lure Jody. If she knows where Papa Joe is, we'll need to get that, too." Alexa looked over at Shane. "For all those reasons, Shane should be on point," Alexa said.
"Good analysis," Filosiani noted. "I agree."
"How's the leg feel?" Alexa asked.
"Okay," Shane said, and surprisingly, aside from some occasional throbbing and muscle weakness, he had very little pain. "Lemme give it a try. But I have to do it alone. If we do a SWAT-type entry, she'll clam up."
Filosiani nodded.
"Anybody got a piece I could borrow?" Shane asked.
"Here," Alexa said, "I have a backup." She handed him another Astra 9.
"What is it with you and these little Spanish Astras?" He grinned.
She smiled. "Great little purse gun, eight-shot clip, no hammer, doesn't snag coming out. Stop complaining… You still owe me four hundred for the last one."
He chambered the Astra and stuck it into his belt, zippering his light windbreaker over it. Then the four of them stepped onto the elevator.
They rode in silence, listening to the innocuous elevator music and light chimes that announced each passing floor. As the elevator stopped, Lieutenant Heart gave Shane the master key.
They exited on sixteen-Lisa's floor. As they got out of the elevator, they saw two more of Lieutenant Heart's blue shirts watching Lisa's door from the stairwell up the hall.
"You're up," Filosiani said. "Number sixteen-twelve."
Shane limped on his bad leg across the plush carpet to Lisa's apartment while Filosiani motioned to the men in the stairwell to stay back.
He rang the bell next to a pair of massive oak double doors. He could hear the chimes inside, waited, then tried again.
Nothing.
He knocked on the door and, when nobody answered, took out the master key and silently fitted it into the lock. He pulled Alexa's Astra, jacked a round into the pipe, then quietly pushed the door open.
The hallway was mirrored on both sides to give the narrow corridor a wider feel.
An old fear hit him.
Shane hated going through mirrored entries when he was shaking a house; too easy to get spotted. He took a deep breath before quickly slipping into the white-on-white condo. He stopped just before entering the living room, keeping his back flat to the mirrored wall on the right, using the mirrors opposite him to search the living room. His ears were straining for any sound of movement. Nothing.
Out of the corner of his vision, he saw Alexa appear in the front doorway with yet another Astra in her right hand. She had more of those little automatics than the Spanish Mafia. He put a finger to his lips and motioned for her to stay outside.
She nodded and held her position as Shane moved carefully into the empty living room. He slid past the wall-to-ceiling plate-glass window and checked the kitchen.
Nothing.
He worked his way down the apartment's center hall, pausing at the guest bedroom door, pushing it slowly open, checking inside.
Empty.
He continued on to the master suite. He had a premonition of death, almost as if he could see around the corner into the future. A cold fear was beginning to ice the edges of his stomach. He cracked the bedroom door and looked in. The bed was mussed, but empty. He entered cautiously, checking the perimeter of the room first. The suite was spacious, dominated by a king-size bed and a plate-glass window that took in the smog-drenched Hillcrest Country Club sixteen stories below.
The bedroom was deserted. The bathroom wasn't.
He found her there, naked.
It wasn't pretty.
What human beings were capable of doing to one another sometimes horrified him.
She was lying in her tub brutally shot in five places. Both kneecaps were shattered, as well as both elbows. The kill shot had opened a gaping hole in the center of her chest. Lisa had been blond and pale in life, but lying in her tub, naked and bloodless, she looked like a broken doll in its white porcelain container. Papery skin wrapped her lifeless body like thin, transparent tissue. Her blond hair was tipped in dried blood, turning the feathered ends red.
Sex goddess in repose.
"Shit!" Shane heard himself say, then called out in a loud voice, "I've got her! It's clear, master bath!"
In seconds, Alexa and Filosiani entered with Lieutenant Heart and the two jump-outs from the stairwell.
"Okay," Filosiani said as soon as he saw the body. "Everybody out. This here's a crime scene. Let's not foul it for Forensics with our own prints and fibers."
They all backed out of the bathroom and stood in the hall.
"Jody's our doer," Shane said softly.
"Then he's turning into a monster," Alexa said softly.
"No," Shane answered, "he's just decided not to hide it anymore."
Filosiani said, "I'll get Homicide out here. My guess is, if she knew where Sandro Mantoor and Jose Mondragon are, then Jody musta found out before he killed her."
"She was pretty tough," Alexa said, with a tinge of admiration as she looked toward the bedroom door. "She must have taken all four joint shots before she talked. After he got what he wanted, he put the fifth round through her heart."
"Sure is the way it looks." Shane shuddered.
"So how do we find Papa Joe?" Alexa said. "If Jody gets to him first, he'll get the money, kill Sandy and Jose, and run. Once he gets out of the country, we'll lose jurisdiction and probably never find him."
"There's a guy, an ex-Air Unit pilot named David VanKirk," Shane said. "IAD terminated him for making night flights, smuggling dope in from Mexico with his police helicopter. If you've still got an address, I'd send somebody out to his place to sit on him. Jody may try and use that chopper to get outta California."
"Good idea," Filosiani said. Because his cell phone wasn't working in this steel-and-glass building, he ran toward the elevator on his way outside to call Homicide and gather up a surveillance detail on David VanKirk.
"This is a dead end, of course," Alexa said softly. "Without Lisa, we've got nothing… nobody… No place to start. My guess is Jody won't take a chance on VanKirk."
Shane nodded.
However, there was one other possibility that began tickling Shane's thoughts. It was a huge long shot, but he had been on such a cold streak, he figured he was due. He hoped it was time for him to finally cash a winner.
Chapter 48
MESSENGER
TREMAINE LANE WAS an L. A. County Sheriff." Shane was standing outside of Century Park East with Lisa and Filosiani. The Homicide team had just arrived, and the Forensics techs were unpacking their blue windowless van.
"Tremaine wasn't in Shephard's file. We don't have any background on him," Alexa answered.
"He was working undercover. The whole Viking thing started at the Sheriff's Department. I always wondered if maybe the culture had somehow migrated to us, through one of these joint-ops task forces we're always running. Tremaine and Hector Rodriquez were tight. Is there any way to pull Sergeant Rodriquez's assignment jacket to see if he ever worked a joint-op with Tremaine Lane?"
"Easy enough," Filosiani said, then picked up the radio on the nearest squad car and got a patch through to the Records Division. He identified himself, told them what he wanted, and asked for a rush.
"Roger that, sir," the female Records Division clerk said. In less than a minute, she was back on the air. "In July of '99, Sergeant Hector Rodriquez of SWAT was assigned to the Cobra Unit in the Valley. Cobra was working with L. A. Impact, which included half a dozen county sheriffs. They worked a big arms deal in the Sunland. Ten Class A felony arrests came down."
"D o you have the names of the other sheriffs who were in on that bust?" Filosiani asked.
"No, sir. You have to get that from Sheriff Messenger's office."
"Call over there and tell Bill Messenger I need a meeting. Tell him it can't wait. I'll be there
in ten minutes."
At five-foot-seven and 135 pounds, Bill Messenger barely made the Sheriffs Department height and weight regs. He was a dark-complexioned, second-generation Egyptian American with close-cropped, silver-gray hair and a penchant for perfectly tailored, double-breasted suits. The jacket he was wearing had brass buttons on it, giving him a distinct Napoleonic tilt. Titanium-framed glasses, as spartan as his waistline, rested atop a Roman nose.
"What's the emergency, Tony?" Messenger said, negotiating his way across his cream and tan office, threading past two form-over-function Danish modern chairs that squatted on delicate tapered legs like futuristic spiders. He shook hands with Tony, Shane, and Alexa. The two L. A. law-enforcement heads were exactly the same height, but that's where the similarities ended. Standing nose to nose, they were the yin and yang of law enforcement. The Day-Glo Dago radiated warmth of personality, while William "Bill" Messenger had the emotional temperature of a garden snake.
"We got a problem," Tony said, looking at the door. "Mind if I close that?"
"My secretary doesn't leak," Messenger said testily.
"Yeah, but her husband might." Tony kicked the door shut, and by mistake it closed too hard, slamming loudly.
Bill Messenger winced.
"Who are these people?" the sheriff asked, looking at Shane and Alexa.
"This is Lieutenant Alexa Hamilton," Tony began.
"The Medal of Valor winner who died a week ago?" Messenger said, and cocked a bushy eyebrow.
"I'll get to that. And this is Sergeant Shane Scully," Tony added.
"The man who killed her. You run a strange shop, Tony." Messenger was glaring at both of them.
"The staged killing of Lieutenant Hamilton was part of an undercover op," Filosiani said. "This pertains to the problem you had a few years back with that rogue group of sheriffs who called themselves Vikings."
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